70 ON THE PROBABLE ORIGIN 
who had here been more completely transformed 
into feudal lords than in the South of France, 
and who retained nothing of the spiritual func- 
tion, except the terrors of excommunication by 
which they endeavoured to support their tem 
poral authority. The inhabitants of Laon had 
formed themselves into a community in the ab- 
sence of their bishop, who had sworn to respect 
their liberties, and the king himself confirmed 
them by a charter. Nevertheless the king not 
long after joined the bishop in an attempt to 
annul the institutions which they had granted, 
and the bishop lost his life in the tumult which 
this act of treachery excited. Soon after, the 
principal citizens having abandoned the city in 
apprehension of the vengeance of the king, the 
adherents of the bishop came forth from their 
retreat and put to death all who had been left 
behind. The king at length interfered, and gave 
to the city a charter, in which avoiding the 
name of commune he virtually established nearly 
the same privileges under the title of imstitutio 
pacis. His successors sometimes confirmed and 
again annulled these privileges, and sometimes 
the citizens, sometimes the bishops, were tri- 
umphant, till in 1331 the community was dis- 
solved by Philip VI. Rheims had to maintain 
a similar succession of contests for its liberties. 
